BATH FESTIVAL: Bath Camerata by Candlelight, Prior Park Chapel

IN a changing world, it's always rewarding to review Bath Camerata: Their quality of tone never varies and Nigel Perrin can always be relied upon for meticulous quality and for doing things in style.

Vespers, by the Finnish composer Einojuhani Rautavaara (no, I don't know how to pronounce it), may not be the best known work around for mixed voices and few there had probably heard much of it before. But it mattered little.

Despite the upsetting incident of a recurrent smoke alarm as things were about to start there were a lot of candles about and the subsequent necessity to leave one or two things out, Perrin's hand on the tiller was steady, comfortable, urging, sometimes cajoling but always total.

He did what he always does and that is to create a dignified spectacle enhanced by choral work of high quality.

This hand-picked choir showed their fine breeding.

Diction was crisp and clear and even deeply muted entrances were crystalline.

Lungs were emptying fast on some of the long-held final cadences but there were no cracks in some beautiful resolutions.

Bass Jeremy Birchall, who was frequently at the extremes of his register, maintained a rich tone and put not a foot wrong.

Reg Burnard